Forgive But Never Forget
by mrie
Summary: Because even though he’s back, it’s never been that simple for Team Seven. But they believe with everything they have, and sometimes, that’s enough. – Team Seven. Sasuke x Sakura.
1. all the right reasons

**title:** Forgive But Never Forget

**summery:** Because it's not simple and not straightforward and it will take time to heal the wounds. Sasuke and something that could be recovery.

**pairing:** Team Seven. Sasuke x Sakura

**note:** This whole thing started as a one shot. Then, it got way to long. Then I read a review of someone that wanted a chaptered story. And thus, this was born. Unfortunately, I can't really write straightforward, chronological stories. So this will be more like a collection of one-shots that are connected and intertwined and - in the end - hopefully tell a complete story.

But, be warned, might fail miserably.

**word count:** 492 (pathetic, really)

.

**1. **

**all the right reasons**

.

She remembers him smiling at her, once.

She doesn't remember when and she doesn't remember why, but that doesn't' matter because she has the memory and she holds onto it tightly and reverently and uses it to light up her darkest days. It was all the proof she needed, all the proof she would ever need, that he could be ok. A monster could never smile like that. A devil can't feel joy.

When she remember that smile she also remembers his protection. The way he stood between her and anything that threatened her. She remembers his voice, so close and so serious, tickling her ear, thanking her for something she never understood. She remembers that he was her teammate and that teammates are forever and that you always, always, always protect your fellows.

But she remembers him leaving her too. And the sick feeling of earlier, as she rushed through her village - her home - to the sight of black cloaks with red clouds and him, leading them.

And so, even though it rips open something inside of her and hurts like Hell and reminds her that this is her worst nightmare, her Devil's choice, she makes her decision. Because Naruto has smiled at her more times than she can count. Naruto had been her teammate, is her teammate, would always be her teammate and no matter what, she will protect him. The world may be crashing down around her and she might want to go hide under her sheets and not come out until the world wasn't blood and screams and making choices that could only break her, but she will not let him down.

The shock is plain on his face as she rockets over Naruto's fallen body.

In the time it takes him to recover and his face to shift into a sneer, she has drawn back her fist and let it fly. Around her impossibly small knuckles, the chakra pumps and gathers and becomes the weapon only she has the power to forge. Her punch connects with his already shocked face and she grimaces to hold back the tears as his body soars back and crashes into the ground with a thud that reverberates in the earth below her feet. He struggles up to stand, breathing hard and his body crackling in anger, angrily swiping at the blood that flows steadily from his nose and mouth.

"Foolish," he spits.

"I could say the same," she retorts and lets her body shift into ready mode.

They look at each other and the world tilts and shifts and changes and in the end, they are there, and she is breathing hard and willing herself not to cry and he is laughing without joy and Naruto is pushing himself up with shaky determination. Then, with a twitch of trained muscle, he steps forward. Eyebrows lowering, she charges to greet him.

Sasuke and Sakura fight.


	2. vicariously

.

2.

_**vicariously**_

.

In the end, it is Sakura that delivers the final blow, Naruto that carries him to the hospital, and Tsunade that heals him.

Funny, Tsunade thinks, how it works out. How Sakura - once-weak, now strong, the one that pledged undying devotion - is the one whose fists knock him into dark, unwilling sleep and thus avenges herself as no one ever could. How Naruto gets to keep his promise and ensure the record of never letting anyone down is kept pristine and unbroken. How she, Tsunade, the hokage, is the one to put the black-haired, pale-skinned deserter back together again.

Sakura wanted to heal him. As she stood, broken and bleeding and burned on scarred earth, her eyes had lit up, had opened, and her tiny mouth had began to form the question. Tsunade stopped her, said she would take care of the boy and ordered Sakura to heal herself and Naruto before joining the other medic-nins. For a second, the girl had narrowed her eyes and twisted her lips, but then Naruto swayed and Sasuke twitched and Sakura gave a hard, firm nod before slipping under her teammate's arm and leading him down the path.

Tsunade was proud of Sakura for that. Just as she's proud of her now, standing in her doorway at Naruto's side. There is nothing of the old, simpering, naive and weak Sakura left in this girl, this girl that holds her shoulders back and her spine straight and tall; that - while Naruto is flawlessly healed - still bears the faint red burn that had, only an hour before, been nothing but gaping black skin burned near off. Reminiscing, Tsunade reaches out and mends the now-minor injury herself. She recalls the exhaustion of healing far too many and the resignation that had her leaving her own wounds only half fixed. Sakura is a true healer, and her raw red skin is nothing if not a testimony to this truth.

Sakura doesn't smile. Neither does Naruto. (Which is the biggest, most accurate indicator of the situation, Tsunade shudders to know.)

"What are you going to do with him?" Naruto near shouts, ignoring all social graces and formality, loud and insistant in his burning curiosity.

"How are the injured?" Tsunade asks, easily ignoring her blonde will-be.

Sakura's green eyes are sharp and biting, just as wanting as Naruto's but tempered by patience and resigned understanding. "Healed."  Because Sakura heals.

"Good." 

Amber eyes fix on the mass of yellow, orange, blue, and light.

"You were saying, Naruto?"

"What are you going to do with the teme?" Barely audible beneath the exuberance, Sakura's voice asks the same.

Dropping her head to her hands and massaging her temples with long, lithe fingers, Tsunade wonders the same thing.

_What indeed?_

She's too old for this, really. Her body may be young and beautiful, coiled and ready for anything, a perfect facade of forever lovely, but inside it's a different story. Inside she's tired and worn and wants to do nothing more than sink into a deep sleep and let everyone else fix all these problems that are, for now, hers. But that's the rub, isn't it? She doesn't trust anyone else - doesn't trust anyone that's old enough, she concedes - with this job. Looking up to the two teens that are staring at her with gazes so intense she would want to laugh, in another world and time, she realizes it's more than that. More than the village, she would trust no one else with her shinobi.

So maybe she's gone soft in her age, seen too much war and blood and hate and just wants this light she sees now - so close and bright and eager - to grow, but when Sakura asks, in a voice that is tremulous and reed thin, if Sasuke will meet his end at her orders (and Naruto gasps, growls low in his throat and Tsunade knows that, no matter what, the boy's just decided that won't happen), she shakes her head. Though she doesn't yet know what will happen - because it's too much to deal with right now; on top of the raid and the deaths and the injury - she knows that Uchiha Sasuke will not be another traitor brought to death by Kohona.

"No."

And as Sakura smiles a real, true smile and Naruto leaps into the air to give a howl of victory, Tsunade prays that this time, these children will have the strength to do what she never could.


	3. hell most personal

.

3.

_**hell most personal**_

.

He comes home and tries not to wake them up.

In that, he fails.

Because as soon as he is shoved - hard, angry, _traitor we hate you_ - through the door, as soon as the voices behind him dim to a hum he can't focus on and the manacles fall from his chapped wrists, they awaken. Invisible to everyone, even him, the ghosts of his past rise and live, whisper in voices that echo through his mind. In every surface, every dust-covered inch of floor and every time-mottled photograph, they breathe and scream.

Sasuke wants out.

He wants to go back to the prison, with its dark walls and safe confinement. To the empty solitude that only gave him opportunity to be angry and livid and hateful. In a cell, he is safe from his past, safe from himself, able to hide and pretend behind the fury of being imprisoned.

Here, in his own damn house, he is vulnerable. Here, he is afraid and hurt, jumping at the shadows of anbu as they set up a guard around his house. In a sort of blind, desperate panic, he wonders if attacking them will get him thrown back to shackles and bars and thick stone walls he doesn't recognize. Logic tells him it will get his head cut off. Maybe that would be better. Less painful and horrifying, he is sure.

Someone - a voice that whispers in his ear now, but it is a voice he can't place - had once told him he must not believe in love, what with all his apparent emptiness. At the time, he had stared, blank and silent, un-acknowledging. Now he remembers and thinks that wherever that faceless someone is, they should know how wrong they are.

Because Sasuke _does_ believe in love. He believes in looking at a person and seeing a god; in the silent vow of _I'd die for you_; the warmth of a familiar laugh and the joy a proud smile can bring. He believes in all those things, remembers them with a biting clarity. Once upon a time, back when the days were bright and this now desolate house teeming with voices and family, he was a child and he was happy and he didn't fear his heart. Oh, he believes in love. And he doesn't want it.

These scars that twists his soul, rip open his chest and shove burning hot pokers to sizzle in his throat and eyes are a part of love as well. This inability to move for fear of seeing phantom blood and hearing long-lost screams is a child's devotion mutated. Weakness and despair and vengeance and irony and death and death and more death: That's what love means to Sasuke.

Hours later, equipped with rags found in the kitchen (right where he thought they would be, something he is unreasonably proud of) and a bucket full of water, Sasuke begins to clean. Every surface is wiped down, every picture cleaned with gentle hands and ever crest shined. It hurts Sasuke - hurts him so badly that he wants nothing more than to throw his things to the ground and rage until hate once again finds him - but he continues. Slowly, methodically, perfectly - just like everything else he does. At his shoulders, the ghosts whose hands he _swears_ he can feel running through his hair whisper their approval.

And because he loves them all, he continues. No matter how badly it hurts.


	4. where there's a will

_._

_**4.**_

_**where there's a will**_

.

_1. Mail_

For weeks, Naruto has the anbu guards stationed at Sasuke's house deliver notes written in sloppy handwriting and stained with unknown substances. _I'm coming to get you, teme! _Over and over, Sasuke reads the crumbled paper and rolls his eyes before throwing it into the ever-growing pile. Then, one day, a day that would have been normal but suddenly is anything but, he shoves a reply under his door and watches silently until the morning guard picks it up.

_Dobe._

Twenty-two hours later, Naruto charges in with a packet of ramen in one hand and Sakura dragging behind the other.

-

_2. Trance_

Carefully, with quiet gestures and the soothing air of one dealing with a wild animal, Sakura informs him that she needs to check his eyes. Because there is no choice, he agrees with a silent nod and burning glare.

He wakes up hours later, alone in the dark, more rested than he can ever remember being.

-

_3. Baby_

"So," Naruto asks, eyebrows wiggling and fox mouth grinning, "how's goal number two going?"

Sakura giggles and covers her mouth, trying to convince herself that the tears are of mirth, not heartbreak most sharp and biting.

Sasuke glares and curls his hands into fists, not willing to tell Naruto (or, more especially, for reasons unknown, Sakura) that his life is so past goals and dreams it's not even worth hoping anymore.

-

_4. Funeral_

The day Sakura and Naruto attend a funeral for a newly initiated anbu member, Sasuke trashes his house. When they visit afterwards, morose and quiet but also thankful, their wide eyes ask the questions their mouths don't yet have the authority to.

Sasuke, who still hardly speaks, who is still quiet and withdrawn and just a prisoner they won't give up on, asks why the man died.

They tell them, with pride in their watery voices.

_He died for the village._

Understanding begins to grow behind blue and green eyes when Sasuke throws his head back and laughs.

-

_5. Wedding_

Sasuke is so silent, so severe, so unwilling to crack under the pressure that is Naruto and Sakura, that Naruto has no solution but to tease him for it without mercy.

"You know," Naruto cackles, "I'll feel really horrible for your wife."

Sasuke, who has been ignoring Naruto with practiced exactitude, turns and stares. Then, he replies. "I'll feel the same for whoever has the misfortune to be tied down with you."   As Naruto laughs - and feels a secret flood of relief and growing possibilities - Sasuke smirks in a soft sort of way, grateful to Naruto for believing in a future that is sometimes so very hard to see.

-

_6. Birth_

She comes one day, without Naruto, still garbed in her medic's gear.

"I delivered a baby today," she laughs, giddy and bouncy and rocking back and forth on her heels, so happy his indifference can't touch her. "He was so beautiful, and so healthy. You should have heard him scream!"

And he's grateful for the break in the boredom, for her presence, for her smile, for the fact that she's talking to him even as he stares back without any expression on his face. So he smirks, carefully, calculatingly, ever so cautious as to not reveal anything that will be too much, and says:  

"Congratulations."

-

_7. Understanding_

"We aren't friends," he tells them one day, as he opens the door and lets them fall in.

For a second, there is silence and a quick glance shot between Naruto and Sakura. Then Sakura shrugs, nonchalant as she can force herself to be. "Ok."

"Whatever, teme."

They follow him into the kitchen and each pick up one of the three piping hot, already poured cups of tea.

-

_8. Kiss_

They come tell him the night before they leave for a week (maybe two) long mission. Words don't say as much, but the actions and the careful dancing (_Just so you know why we aren't bringing tomatoes.._) are obvious to all three. Sakura and Naruto are leaving. And they don't want Sasuke to wonder – _worry_ – about them.

He's already out the door and she is following when Sasuke reaches out.

Lightly, gently, so impossibly fleeting that Sakura almost doesn't turn around, Sasuke touches her shoulder. When she turns and stops, his onyx eyes are on her.

"Be careful."

She leaves and swears to come back safe.

-

_9. Police_

"I wanted to protect," he tells her, carefully not looking at the picture she holds in her small hands.

Because he is not looking, he does not see the radiant smile of hope renewed she flashes him.

-

_10. Insanity_

No one understands why their favorite ninja and beloved medic disappear into a house that might as well be haunted to visit a boy that might as well be the devil and come out with smiles and laughs. Neither does Sasuke,

Perhaps the miracle is that, for perhaps the first time, he's ok with not knowing.


	5. crash collision

.

5.

_**crash collision**_

.

For all his strength and power and talent, Kakashi has the emotional maturity of a five year-old.

Six, at least, he argues with himself. A five year-old would have already ran crying from the room, desperate for freedom from this tension that could easily be speared with a kunai. He's not crying; not yet. No, Kakashi's taken refuge behind his orange book and surreptitiously pushed his chair into the darkest corner of the room. See? Much more mature than tears.

But still, he knows, not nearly mature enough.

If he were truly an adult - truly able to handle conflict and anger and hate without the aid of knifes and chakra - he would be trying to dull the biting stabs of Sai's comments; convincing Sasuke that _no, we did not _replace_ you_. He would have visited his former student sometime before Sakura and Naruto finally caught him and dragged him off before he could think up a proper excuse.

_But I didn't _want _to_, whines the voice in his mind.

Except, he kinda of did. He kind of wanted to follow Naruto and Sakura down the mossy trails of the Uchiha complex. He kind of thought about taking one of the anbu guard slots just to get closer, just to hope that with opportunity, he could perform his role as sensei. He kinda of wishes he would just grow a spine and suck up his - is it fear? - and _do it_. Say what he needs to say and do what he needs to do.

"Sai," Kakashi says, standing up and smiling blankly. "We should go now."

"But I haven't yet practiced my subtlety." Sai informs him, smiling a smile that has an edge of anger and - Kakashi is almost surprised to see - hate. "I have not yet informed Traitor what a scum bag he is. Not entirely, at least."

Sasuke is scowling heavily, sitting with a ramrod straight back and curling his fingers in and out of claws. Sakura stands near him, watching carefully, body tight, ready to interfere. Kakashi knows better than to push their luck.

"Well, then we'll have to return for you to practice later. Maybe you should rehearse? Make it worth it?" Kakashi keeps his smile in place, glances down at his book. "Besides, I thought you and Naruto were going to spar?"

Sai nods, thinking. "Yes. I'll practice. Perhaps even talk to Ino about how to do it best. She's quite good at that sort of thing, after all." He turns to Naruto, sitting obliviously in the middle of the floor. "Come on, Dickless, let's go. _"_

With a splutter and a shout, Naruto bounds after him, threats ringing in the halls and down the street. Kakashi smiles, and this time it is real.

"He's not coming back," Sasuke says, turning to Sakura, who has relaxed and is smiling with her hands on her hips. "I will not allow it."

"He grows on you," she promises, grin stretching. "But I better go follow those two. Goodness knows what they'll do if I'm not there to kick their asses." She looks at Kakashi. "Right, sensei?"

"Oh, yes."

Sakura is too perceptive, Kakashi thinks bitterly. He sees it in her eyes, in the way they narrow and flick to the boy sitting at her side. She's going to leave them - the not-pupil and no-longer teacher - alone and she's going to do it now. He hasn't even had time to work up the energy, yet. But still, there is a threat it her stance and in her movements. And Kakashi still remembers the feeling of the earth shattering around him. If he isn't sure whether or not he fears Sasuke, he _is _sure Sakura can be terrifying.

Before she leaves she ruffles Sasuke's hair. With a shock, Kakashi sees the boy not flinch away, not growl, not hiss and mutter about _annoying girl_. He sees the black-haired head nod goodbye and barely - just barely, but Kakashi's always seen beneath the underneath - lean into her touch. For some reason, this little nothing gives him strength to not flee as Sakura's footsteps fade.

But he still hides behind his book for a few minutes. Just to build up willpower.

When he looks up, Sasuke is glaring at him. Blandly, Kakashi grins back. And then he stops, realizing his mistake.

_This is not nothing_.

He steps foreword and Sasuke stands up, drawing his lean form to its full height. Feeling like an old man, Kakashi realizes that he only has a few inches on the boy. Was it only four years ago he could rest his hand on that black head? 

"Sasuke."

"Kakashi." 

No sensei. No respect.

"I wanted to tell you, Sasuke, that I'm sorry I haven't visited you yet. I've been busy - "

"Liar." 

There is a bit of reminiscence in the boy's tone. A bit of familiarly and time long gone. A bit of the boy-child the world hasn't seen in years. It helps soften the blow a bit, the pain that comes with vomiting the words: "I'm sorry, Sasuke."

The onyx eyes never flicker, never show anything. But his voice is still softer than it could be and his body not as drawn in harsh lines as Sasuke replies.

"I know."

Leaving the house and waving to his fellows, Kakashi thinks his maturity level should be labeled as that of a ten year-old. At least.


	6. to know

.

6.

_**to know**_

.

She finds it while cleaning out Tsunade's office.

It is an accident. A little blip in the order of the universe, a moment that could have passed by as a little nothing but us suddenly transformed into a moment that is anything but inconsequential. It is, she thinks, hysteric and fumbling and barely remembering to breathe, a defining moment.

She only read it because of the name scrawled boldly on the front. How many other files and scrolls had she skimmed over, hardly even glancing at before sorting into piles, trying to find order? But it is no real surprise this one caught her attention and drew her eyes; it does, afterall, have _his_ name on it. And no matter what she says or thinks or does, that will always be enough to draw her in and hold her captive.

With hands that are shaking so violently the medical part of her brain is concerned, she sets _it_ down. For a second, she stares at _it_. Simple and unimportant looking, deceptively innocent and nondescript. The seconds tick by in heavy, crushing silence as Sakura's brain whirs and stalls and circles and short-circuits. Finally, like a tsunami, it hits her and she begins to cry.

The sobs and the shaking limbs make it hard to struggle to her feet. But she manages. And then she is running. Faster, faster, _faster_. Down stairs and through hallways and across roofs and over trees and she can't stop, can't think, can only run and run and run until her legs give out and her fists slams into a familiar door, sending spider cracks dancing over the finish.

"Sakura-chan!" The door falls away and she falls down. Naruto's voice sounds and then his arms are grasping her, lifting her into the air and off the cold, cold floor. He sits her on a chair, holding her shoulders and keeping her upright as he kneels in front of her. "Sakura-chan! Sakura! What happened?"

Absently, she feels guilty for causing the naked fear and worry in his eyes. Her hands rise and grasp his own. She knows he can feel her trembling.

"Naruto..." she starts, voice watery and faint. "It's - I found ... It's Sasuke."

--

A clan with too much power.

A boy prodigy.

A child that could never understand.

An ordered slaughter.

And.

He.

Didn't.

Know.

--

When she is done, Naruto doesn't move. But then she feels it. Feels the claws grow against her skin, feels the sudden surge of power in the room - the sudden rage. As she reaches out and grabs him, knowing what is happening, his eyes blink and in that moment, change from blue to red. His crouch becomes feral, and when he speaks, it is not the voice she knows.

"_Baa-chan_."

"No, Naruto," Sakura says, grabbing his arms and holding them tight, squeezing until he looks at her. In the red gaze - the stare with bestial hate and a thousand years of rage - she is almost scared of her best friend. "It wasn't Tsunade-sempai that - that - " She can't finish. Not-Naruto's eyes watch her intensely. "It wasn't her."

"But she didn't tell us."

Ten minutes later they are standing in the hokage's doorway, and Tsunade is picking the file off the ground, eyes darting between it and the children, putting the pieces - Sakura, eyes red, face swollen, holding Naruto's hand like a restraint; Naruto, red-eyed, frowning, clawed hands curled tight - together.

Naruto's mouth opens, ready to ask, because he always has been too full of hope, but she beats him to the punch.

"It's true."

Sakura knew it was. She'd read the file afterall. But there is something about hearing it said by someone she trusted, someone who would actually know, that makes it _real_. And Sakura can't handle real. By being true and serious and not a nightmare, it changes her entire world, paints it new colors and taints it with lies and violence and hate and - and - and everything is different now. The same but new, no longer hidden in the dark but forced into the light and the lights are not really light, because light is bright and happy and this is sick and wrong and - and what about Sasuke? Where does this leave him? What does this make him? He's not the same as he was. He can't be because this tilts everything he stood for on its axis and twists it around and skews the facts and - and what about her? What about Sakura? Who only ever wanted to be better and make the world better? Who is an agent apparent for something that kills families and shatters dreams? What about Naruto? Can he still be love and hope and joy bundled into a body if his goal is to lead all this?

"No!" Naruto's hand softens in her grip and when she looks, his crying eyes are blue. "But - But baa-chan! It _can't_ be true - it can't!"

"No," Sakura whispers, shaking her head, trying to clear her thoughts of this crushing darkness. "No. No, no, no."

Tsunade nods, face blank but eyes shining.

"It is. I'm sorry you had to find out."

--

The guards look at them funny as they knock on the door. It's nearly midnight, afterall.

But Sasuke answers. They knew he would. Even if he doesn't say it, the bags beneath his eyes and the stiffness of his figure tell of insomnia. Besides, now they know the monsters that live in his closet, know exactly what ghosts could haunt his every move. It's easy to see, now, why he doesn't like to sleep.

In the second that he swings open the door and looks at them, his eyes widen. His mouth opens but the words are entirely unexpected.

"You know."

It is not a question.

"I'm sorry," Sakura says, and she hopes Sasuke understands that she's never meant anything more than she means those two words. "I'm sorry."

"When I'm - When I'm hokage... " Naruto flounders, face desperate, trying to find the promise he can make and fix this whole thing. "I -" Finally, he stops. His head shoots up, tall and proud, and his eyes are wet when they meet Sasuke's gaze. "I'm sorry too."

And then, Sasuke's eyes are red. Star-marked and beautiful, full of loathing and despair, something like a whimsical nightmare. "I hate y.. _them_ all." He says it like a challenge, a dare.

"I can understand that."

For a moment, all is still. Then Sasuke steps aside and lets them into the pitch dark of his house.  

From there, they begin again.


	7. outlaws

.

7.

_**outlaws**_

.

In their renewal, there are certain rules.

They do not, for instance, talk about _that night_. It happened and it changed everything, but they were there so they know and thus, it is never spoken about. Sometimes, in brief silences and flickering stares, it is present and alive. But it is _never_ mentioned. Never. They don't talk about the time in-between either. Sasuke doesn't tell of Orochimaru or Hebi or the hunt or Madara. Sakura never rambles about Tsunade and being left alone and the first time brick shattered beneath her fists. Naruto doesn't gloat about his training or his adventures or how hard they tried to bring the deserter back. By avoiding the past, they avoid the guilt, the anger, the hate and crushing sadness.

(Except they don't - not at all. It's still there, sometimes, invisible and heavy but unacknowledged.)

Those are the rules.

Unfortunately, Sai has never understood unspoken law.

" – Ino was _so_ mad!" Sakura laughs, telling her acceptable story of yesterday. "I thought Shikamaru was dead!"

"No you didn't," interrupts Sai, face smiling but confused. Sakura cocks a resigned eyebrow, waiting for the explanation she is sure will come with patient, albeit tired, acceptance. "You know the lovely Ino would never kill Lazy; he's her teammate." There is a pause, and Sai's face stretches into a bland smile. His eyes flash with a hard light. "I only know of one nin that would sink to such levels. Isn't that right, Scum?"

Surprisingly, Sasuke's face is impassive, his voice calm. Because is fingers are hanging at his sides, no one sees the way they clench. "I will not defend my actions."

Around them, the atmosphere shifts. With his words, with his icy stare and seemingly simple admission, Sasuke has tilted their bubble of a world with no past on its side. Sakura has to make a conscious, careful effort to keep her words from shaking.

"I don't know about that, Sai. If I could have, I would have murdered Naruto when he told me he was leaving to train with - with Jiraiya."

"Eh," Naruto chuckles nervously from his corner of the sofa. "I thought you _were_ going to kill me, Sakura. That first time you punched me in head, I thought I heard my skull crack." His smile softens. "I was proud of you though, _especially_ when you healed the bruise."

Laughing, the sound only a little off kilter, Sakura toes the blonde. "Says the one who came back as powerful as Sas – " For a half-second, the space between heartbeats, Sakura pauses and everyone in the room watches her with wide, wide eyes. " – ke."

What are friends for, if not to steady you in your weakness? Naruto does. "No way! I'm _more _powerful than teme will ever be!" He stands, puts one hand behind his head and flashes a victory sign with the other. "Believe it!" 

"And yet, I could have easily killed you, had there not been interference."

And so the argument begins. On one side, the sunshine blonde shouts with a rage that reddens his face and has his arms gesticulating wildly, flailing. Watching him with a cool, condescending smirk, the black-eyed boy shakes his heads and sends barbs flying. Two children that couldwouldshould_will_ be best friends argue about who could - would - kill the other. Soon the verbal battle has escalated to a comparison of jutsus learned, missions completed, miles traveled. Sai is confused. Sakura is laughing.

Team Seven has never followed the rules.

-

**note: **I am the goddess of updating. Yes, I accept hero worship.


	8. this little light of mine

.

8.

_**this little light of mine**_

_i'm gonna let it shine, let it shine, let it shine, let it shine_

.

.

1. _Impossible_

"I'm sorry," he says, still wild from the nightmare, slumped on his bed and staring at the kunai imbedded in the wall behind Sakura and Naruto, "I'm sorry."

-

2. _Love_

"I'm glad I know," Sasuke tells them, hands clenching the picture frame impossibly tight, looking at the face of the man he once swore to kill.

-

3. _Roses_

Winter comes it and brings a Sasuke that asks – head ducked, voice soft, eyes darting from her face to the floor steady beneath his feet – Sakura to get him roses for... _for kaa-san's garden._

-

4. _Rescue_

"Stupid thing was yowling all night," grumbles the even more tired than usual Uchiha, resentfully stroking the cat curling around his feet, "and the guards were sick enough of the noise to let me go get it."

-

5. _March_

Three months after being locked away in his house, Sasuke sits across the table from Naruto, next to Sakura, and begins to tell them about snakes, devil-doctors, and a fight.

-

6. _Hospital_

Sakura doesn't remember telling him about the child, but a week later Sasuke asks about a little boy with an accidentally self-inflicted kunai wound.

-

7. _Red_

Kakashi is the only one to notice that sometimes, when Sakura sits a little too close or lets her touch linger for a little to long, the skin behind Sasuke's ears flushes – just the tiniest bit.

-

8. _Temperature_

"You," he says from behind her, dropping a blanket and letting it swallow her small frame, "are going to get sick."

-

9. _Touch_

It's very hard for him to sleep, but when they are near – in the same room, on the same couch, breathing the same air – it is not impossible.

-

10. _First Time_

Surprisingly, the first time they hear him laugh is at a story told by Sai and concerning Naruto, a hot spring, and an established gender.

-

11. _Fake_

For a second, she is frozen simply because every animal part of her is screaming in terror; then she realizes his eyes are only like that to intimidate her into giving him last rice roll.

-

12. _Redemption_

"My team was under orders – _my_ orders – to leave all civilians unharmed: It was just a show."

-

13. _Shower_

Tired and dirty after sparring with Naruto, she asks to use his shower while the boys argue about something or another; he agrees and when she is done there are towels folded at the door, all clean lines, sharp angles, and from Sasuke.

-

14. _Picture_

She can't find him and her search leads her to a room that's not as dusty as the rest but is just as hopelessly bleak, the only thing worth noticing the picture on the nightstand – the very same place as her own copy.

-

15. _Backyard_

The anbu cannot resist Sakura's puppy dog pleas or Naruto's infuriating insistence, no matter how they try, so for the single afternoon Sasuke is allowed in the sun he smiles a tiny, thankful grin.

-

16. _Best Friend_

Sasuke is too quick for him, so as Naruto leaps out from his hiding place behind the pillar to tackle the other boy, all he gets is bleeding nose and a voice above him scoffing, "I don't know why you're my best friend."

-

17. _Taste_

Three nights after Sakura mentions a particular food she's been craving, it is waiting in the kitchen – hot and steaming – for her and Naruto.

-

18. _Leather_

"You'd make a great slave," Naruto declares mere seconds before a cup of near-boiling tea is flung against his head.

-

19. _Clothes_

Silently, Sasuke hands her a clean blue shirt, emblazoned with the Uchiha fan, to replace the red one with tea dribbling all down the front.

-

20. _France_

"I'm going to travel the world!" she laughs, spreading her arms wide, smile only increasing tenfold when he replies, with a roll of his eyes: "If I ever get out of here, I'll come with you."

-

21. _Confusion_

The day Sasuke offers him a hand after he (once again) falls out of his chair, Naruto chokes on his own spit.

-

22. _Time_

"We have a lot to make up for," she tells her fretting mother with a heartbreaking smile.

-

23. _Roam_

Sometimes he looks out past the windows and down the windswept streets and she comes very, very close to asking what visions of before he sees.

-

24. _Egypt_

"Sasuke… Are you wearing eyeliner?"

-

25. _Hope_

Beneath his eyes the circles are darker than ever, but his voice is more earnest than they have heard as he whispers, "I'm glad you came."

--

**note:** In which there is _some_ Sasuke x Sakura - ness. Really. It's there. See? A couple are positively _overflowing_ in sexual tension. Right, Neon Genesis, right? I hope that's enough for now, dear, but I promise - all of you - there will be more!

Oh. And twenty-four… Ancient Egyptians loved their eyeliner, see?


	9. if only, if only

.

9.

_**if only, if only**_

.

1.

Sasuke doesn't regret leaving Kohona.

He tells Sakura this one day as she sits and reads, all too comfortable in his silent, ancient house. She asks and he answers and for a second, the light in her eyes – the one that is always, always, always there – fades to nearly nothing. Then it is back and it is only just tempered by knowledge.

"Oh," is the soft, short, empty response she gives before returning to her scrolls and reading with eyes that are blinking far too frequently.

Watching her with carefully black features, Sasuke is glad she doesn't have the heart to ask why.

Not that he would tell her the truth.

He is glad to have left for Sound because of how much he hated Kabuto; because of how his experiments made the bile rise in the back of Sasuke's throat and his chakra pound in anger. Because the screams took weeks to stop echoing in his mind and eventually drove him to sneak - quietly, quietly, quietly - into the chamber they came from and break the bonds of a prisoner that thanked him on all fours. He is thankful to Orochimaru, and his snake-tongue that flicked out like a worm and convinced Sasuke that power was not always worth the price paid.

Sasuke doesn't regret leaving, because in Kohona he could never have proved to himself that he wasn't a monster yet.

2.

Even after all it's cost him – _everything_ – Sasuke doesn't regret hunting his brother.

Without the hunt, he never could have found Itachi. If he never found Itachi, he would never have had the chance to speak with him. And just because the truth hurts like hell and damnation doesn't mean it doesn't make his existence some milifragment of a shard better. His brother hadn't been a monster; his brother hadn't hated him. And Itachi had wanted his little brother to kill him, had wanted the end that Sasuke had almost gave him, hadn't he? He had tried his very hardest to fulfill that dream. Like a good brother.

It is a twisted, turning, empty sort of logic, but it logic that makes sense to Sasuke and gives him some semblance of an emotion that doesn't try to carve his heart into nothingness. Years and years might have been stripped from his life, his childhood might have vanished into training, hunting, training, killing, but in the end...

In the end his brother loved him.

He refuses to regret that.

3.

Sasuke does not regret attacking Kohona.

They deserve to know what he thinks of them; how much he hates what they did to him - what they did to his family. He has hurt so bad for so long and it was for them, always for them, always for their false peace and lying love.

"I don't," he hisses at the hokage, furious and livid and straining against the guards so he can be just a little closer to her, can let her see the red-hot truth that burns in his eyes. _I don't, I don't, I don't don'tdon't__**don't**_**. **

The woman blinks, slowly, and then nods over Sasuke's shoulder. Slowly but irresistibly, they begin to pull him back, out of the room, away from amber eyes that are staring right into him. Calmly, without emotion, she stands and watches as the group leaves. But before he is gone, the hokage speaks.

"Maybe someday, Uchiha."

Sasuke snarls, bestial in his rage.

The growl does its job: The little voice that speaks from the corner of his mind and whispers, _perhaps,_ is silenced.

1.

Sasuke doesn't have many regrets, but he does regret Sakura and Naruto.

He regrets everything about them, everything they ever meant to him. He resents them both; Naruto for being better than him in far too many ways, Sakura for being so weak and fragile and in need of protection. For letting him leave and living without him he will never forgive, for changing and not staying the same and for becoming so much and learning so many things, he hates them. If they hadn't been in his life, he would have been spared so much pain and anger and something else that cannot (will not) be defined.

Without them waltzing into his life at twelve, he would never have become part of a team, would never feel that tug of an unbreakable bond. If they had just left him alone and not tried to become a part of him, it wouldn't have hurt to walk away. Not tied to anything or anyone, he could have completed his mission sooner. Maybe he would have been able to exact his revenge of the village that stole everything from him.

But that's not all. He regrets them for other reasons - reasons that are hidden and secret and will never know the light of day.

He regrets that in this life, the one he's been given, he couldn't have been Naruto's best friend: the kind that shares your secrets and your dreams and your life. Or that Sakura – who reminds him of his mother and thus of happiness – could never have had his love the way she always wanted. For a million reasons that are connected and twined together into a string of sharp pain and could-have-beens, Sasuke wishes they had never been born. (He includes himself in 'they'.)

Sasuke regrets Sakura and Naruto being thrown into the jumbled equation of his life because, with them included, there is suddenly much more to regret.

4.

Sasuke does not regret (_loving_) Sakura and Naruto.

**--**

**note:** Yes, I meant to have that '1' thrown in there. And, yes, I am either profound or a bumbling buffoon. (Personally, I'm thinking buffoon.)


	10. more than enough

.

10.

_**more than enough**_

.

"Karin, Jugo, Suigetsu. Do you know them?" His hand is still on the door, but when Sakura speaks, it drops. Shock, pure and simple, courses through him.

At her side, Naruto bounces. "Yeah, teme? Do you? We're supposed to find out and then tell baa-chan."

Because they're his interrogators now. Because his glares and short, clipped answers were too simple, to empty, and the hate in his eyes drove Tsunade crazy. They'll get more out of you, she'd said, sighing as she marked the record scroll.

And they did.

"Yes," says Sasuke, following them into the kitchen, trying to ignore the jerkiness of his movements, the shakiness of his breath. "I do. Why?"

"Well," Naruto says, flopping into a chair and putting his feet on the table, "they were caught by a Suna patrol, like, what was it, Sakura? Three days ago?"

"Two." Sakura sits and pulls out a scroll. "Yes. Two days ago a Suna patrol group intercepted a team of three nin - one female and two male. Upon capture and interrogation they revealed themselves as Karin, Jugo, and Suigetsu and claimed to be teammates of the missing - "

Wide-eyed, Sakura gapes at Sasuke. Naruto does too. Staring at the scroll snatched from Sakura's hands, Sasuke doesn't look at them. His eyes are skimming, fast and almost frantic, down the carefully transcribed figures. His fingers dimple the paper with the pressure they exert. Finally, he looks up.

"What will happen to them?"

It takes Sakura a moment to answer. "I... What?"

"My team," he slams the scroll to the table, points at the names. "What will happen to them?'

As he says team, Sakura flinches. "Well -"

"Will they be put to death?"   "Bastard," Naruto is smiling, but it looks strained, pained, forced, "if anyone would be executed, it's you."

"They'll be rehabilitated, I think. Like you." Shakily, Sakura looks up at Sasuke, trying to look reassuring. "And that - Jugo? - they're going to send him down here later, because of his curse seal and - "

"And you'll help him." It isn't quite a question, but there is a lilt to his voice that tells Sakura he needs to be assured.

"Yes."

"And don't wor - well, Gaara will be good to them, Sasuke. He'll be fair."

Sasuke nods, looks at the paper spread before him, and moves to sit. Carefully picking up her pen, Sakura swallows. "Teammates?"

"Yes. Former members of both Hawk and Snake."

He waits until Sakura's hand has stopped moving. When their eyes meet she slowly sets down the pen.

"Is that all you needed to know?"

"Yep," says Naruto, grin back with gusto. "That's all. But what's up with this Snake and Hawk, eh?"

 As Sasuke starts his tale, cautiously at first, but then with more enthusiasm, more detail, he watches the other two and wonders if he should feel more guilty. But he doesn't feel anything other than creeping relief. Naruto's bright, bright smile flashes and wavers, shifts and shines to match Sakura's bright, bright eyes, that are so eager and full and wondering and Sasuke thinks about his other team; about glasses and scared monsters and blue hair and - and he thinks that he's ok with this... that he's ok with Team Hawk disintegrating into nothing, letting this chapter of his life close and end. They aren't paying too heavily for his mistake: They'll be able to live their lives perhaps better than before.

And maybe -- _maybe_ -- he's just-as-close-as-he-can-get -to-glad that Sakura is laughing at him, slowly but truly, and Naruto is smiling a smile that he remembers from so long ago and that it doesn't feel anything like loss, this moment.

It feels like the exact opposite.

_**--**_

**note:** I don't like this chapter. I liked the original, but this isn't it. Wanna know why?

My computer crashed. I've already thrown my fit on lj, so suffice it to say that _FBNF_ suffered greatly as a result. I'll apologize in advance: Things will be moving a bit slower, probably, and a whole lot jerkier.

(_I'm sorry!_)

Now, concerning the actual chapter: Recognizing that Team Hawk/Snake meant something to Sasuke is important, I feel. It makes him a - for lack of a better word - _nicer_ person. But I don't think he's bonded to them quite so strongly as Team Seven. So I mentioned them and then knocked them out of the picture.

'Cause that's how I roll.


	11. girl talk

.

11.

_**girl talk**_

.

"I know I'm beautiful, but the staring is making me uncomfortable."

"I am _not_ staring at you."

"Oh, Sasuke-kun, it's ok. You don't have to be shy."

"Do _not_ call me that."

"Whoa. Cut the glare. Geez, I was just joking! And stop that - I am _not_ a fangirl anymore, thank you very much."

"Hn."

"Really. I'm not."

"..."

"So... Are you going to continue to stare at the wall right over my shoulder or are we going to do something cool and fun and entertaining?"

"You're ridiculous."

"So I've been told. Wanna hear a story?"

"No."

"Well, too bad. I'm the one Sakura asked to come _baby-sit_ you for the week, and thus am the one Tsunade-sama gave the mission scroll to and thus am the one that you have to listen to!"

"I'm not putting up with this nonsense."

"Why, yes, actually, you are. Because if you don't sit back down like a nice little boy and listen to my wonderful tale, I _will_ scream and the guards _will_ come and I _will_ tell them you attacked me."

"Tch."

"Very nice. Alright then. Ahem... Once upon a time there was a fairy. And this fairy had a big... nose. A big, fat nose that wasn't really all that fat at all, to be honest, but you know how demonic kids can be. Anyway. People teased the fairy a whole bunch, because of her nose. But she had a friend that was a princess and the princess was beautiful and kind and brave, so she protected the fairy from the bullies. They were best friends after that. Well, they were, until they met the prince. See, he was so, so pretty - actually, he was almost kinda girly-pretty and - "

"Ino..."

"You know my name! Good for you! Now shut up. Ok. So this prince was really pretty and really strong and the princess and the fairy both fell in love - in _like_ - with him. Which was bad. Because even though they were best friends, they were horribly competitive and awfully nasty to each other about him and - well - in the end they stopped being friends because of it. Something that the princess _absolutely_ resents the prince for, be the way.

"But then something happened. The prince left. Gone. Poof. Just like that. And the fairy - oh, the poor fairy - it crushed her, see? Because not only did the prince leave her, but her... pet fox - I did tell you she had a pet fox, right? Because she did. - her pet fox left her too. But he came back pretty quick, so that wasn't _too_ bad, but still. It sucks for her, right?

"Are you done yet?"

"No! I'm not. Stop interrupting. Right, the fairy was upset. But then she started practicing her magic, honing it, working harder and harder and harder to get strong enough to bring the prince back. And since he was gone, she became friends with the princess again, which was good, because they'd really missed each other. And the princess was so over the prince anyway.

"Ok. Now's here's the good part. One day, the prince came back. And guess what he was there for?

"Ino..."

"Guess!"

"No."

"He was there to kill them! The fairy and the fox! Kill them! So what do they do? Kick his ass of course. And then - Then they forgave him. Just like that. Can you believe it? The idiots."

"Don't call Naruto and Sakura idiots."

"... I never did! Gosh, Sasuke, reading into things like that isn't healthy."

"That was a ludicrous story."

"I thought it was beautiful, personally. So poignant."

"You're annoying."

"_What?_ Seriously? Sakura said you didn't day that anymore - the liar!"

"Sakura isn't annoying anymore."

"..."

"..."

"Ahem. Well... It's getting dark now, so I can leave you and not feel guilty about it. Get some sleep though, ok? You look like crap and you'll need to be awake for story time tomorrow."

"No more stories."

"Oh yes. More stories. Hmm... I'm thinking next we'll move onto the happily-ever-after, ok? Yeah. That'll be good. See you tomorrow Sasuke!"

"Hn."

**--**

**note:** Ino fails at subtlety. But I think that's why I love her so much in this chapter. This was fun :)


	12. destruction

.

12.

**_destruction _**

.

When he is with them, he begins to fall apart.

It is a gentle unraveling, a slow spun destruction so soft, so light, that he is never the wiser. But it is there. In Naruto's smile, returned with rolled eyes and a muttered jibe. In the seconds that Sakura's arm brushes his, the touch unpunished and almost familiar. With light and laughs and blooming memories of happiness, the darkness begins to shred and feather into wisps of smoke. And when they smile, wave, remind him tomorrow, tomorrow, we're doing this, there is nothing left but a memory, a guide, a hope of what Sasuke could be.

When they leave, he kills it.

(_Until the day the smile, the touch, the_ love, _lights a small true flame, burning bright enough to keep the black away. Then, this Sasuke lives to see the morrow.)_

_-_

_-_

**note:** So I made you wait for this ugly baby chapter. Beg pardon.


	13. unconditional

.

13.

**_unconditional_**

.

And then they almost fall apart.

It has been a careful dance, this tango of three, and they have played their roles with precision, with grace, with absolute absence of all those things – anger, betrayal, fear – that, in reality, boil just below the surface. Tonight they come out to play.

Tonight, Sasauke looks at Naruto , whose eyes are wide, whose mouth is guilty, whose shoes are freckled with tiny pieces of glass, the only remnants of a once proud trinket. The black glare hardens beneath suddenly sharp and biting brows. Sakura watches, trepidation curling in her stomach, already annoyed at the bickering that is sure to follow and then –

"I _hate _you."

– it comes crashing down.

In the sudden impenetrable silence, she swears the word echoes. Hate. Hate. Hate hate hate. For a second, the thud of her heart is achingly absent; then it is back and pounding with a vengeance in her chest, in her throat, in her stomach. Words jumble in her head, struggle up her throat, but cannot make it past her shocked, immobile tongue.

"What?" Naruto's voice sounds like a gasp, a rip, a muted scream. "What did you say?"

And Sakura looks back at dark hair, a sharp chin, a defiant scowl, and begs him to deny. He doesn't. Instead, before her eyes, Sasuke shrinks into himself - curls his shoulders in, ducks his head, still looks at them with a careful, exact apathy. But he doesn't say a word. Something in Sakura – something bred of years, of strength, of _I can protect myself_ – dies.

Then Naruto begins to shout. With wildly gesticulating hands and an ever-reddening face, he screams out that you, you have no right!

Sakura, still mute, agrees. Doesn't he know? Doesn't he know how hard they've tried? How much shit she Naruto and Kakashi and Sai and Tsunade and everyone have been through? They're tried so hard. Everyone. So damn hard. For him. Always for him, for his twisted choices and his blackened heart; for the boy he once was and the soul they cannot, for the life of them, give up on.

She hates him, in this moment. Really, truly, scaldingly hates him. She hates him for his glares, for his scoffs, for his casual indifference as he damned himself (because that's what he did, doesn't he know? He's killing and destroying and hurting himself, even more than he's hurting them – and oh how he's hurting them). Sakura hates Sasuke for every reason in the world; mostly, she hates him because she cannot.

And that, more than anything, ignites the sudden flood of anger. Because this boy – this _boy_ – should not be able to do this. He should not be allowed to send her heart spiraling, her soul aching, her best friend shouting in near tears. Like bile, the fury rises, hot and uncontrollable, squeezing her chest with an iron fist.

"You tried to kill me!" Naruto continues his rant, arms flapping wildly. "Best friends don't pull that shit, Sasuke, best friends – Friends _– "_

As Naruto flounders for the word, Sakura finds it. Her throat rips against the force of her shout, the raw emotion it contains. "Friends love each other!"

Again, there is silence. The unsaid words are louder then the spoken: But you don't love us.

Then the anger is gone and Sakura is suddenly so very tired. She wants to leave, escape this tension, this moment, this reality. She wants to go home, where there is a warm bed and a soft pillow to catch her tears. She wants to wake up tomorrow and know this was all a dream. That really, she hadn't just lost the thing she was just beginning to think she might once again have.

Sakura opens her mouth and wonders if maybe, this pain will fade. "We love you Sasuke, but –"

But not if you don't love us? Not if you're going to stand there and teat us like we're less than nothing? Not if these last months have been a lie, not if you're not really coming back, not if you really can't be saved? _But what?_

It hits her. But nothing.

The epiphany relieves no pain; instead, it only doubles. "We love you."

The black eyes watch her silently.

"Yeah," says Naruto, like Sakura, looking as if he could fall to the ground from pure exhaustion at any moment. Emptied of anger, all that is left is a dead-eyed boy, watching his universe shatter. "We love you. See you tomorrow."

There is a horrible, ghosting mockery of a smile on Naruto's face as he turns and offers his hand to Sakura. His shoulders are slumped, his steps are halting, and the hand he reaches out is trembling. He looks as if the world has been placed on his shoulders. Never has Sakura seen her Naruto looking so defeated, and this knowledge manages to send a pang to her already aching heart. She takes his hand, squeezes it tight, and lets him lead her out.

Turning her back to Sasuke is the hardest thing she's ever done. It feels wrong on so many levels. It feels like irony defined. By doing this, by walking away now, she is accepting that, no matter how had she fought, this battle can never be won. She is shredding her heart, stomping on the pieces. She is giving up on a dream she swore to never let go.

Only the warm, steady squeeze of Naruto's hand keeps her from turning back. Against her palm, his pulse echoes, thuds, reminds her that – look, see, feel – all is not lost. She isn't alone. Even without _him_, she can be happy, she can be loved. She doesn't need him. Naruto, Kakshi, Sai, her family, her friends – they are enough. After only seconds, her heart gives up under the weight of such devastating hope.

"I lied."

There is nothing Sakura can do to stop her body from spinning in place. The sudden acceleration of her heart, the fierce, mad hope that burns her insides – all are beyond her control.

Sasuke takes a single halting half-step towards them. One of his hands reaches out so faintly, so minutely, that she hardly notices. There is a horrible sadness in the softness of his lips, the furrow of his brow.

"I don't – I don't hate you."

The smile that splits Sakura's face threatens to never leave.

Because _this_ – this is not an end.


	14. recall

.

_14._

**_recall_**

.

When the day finally comes that he is allowed to step outside the walls of his house, he almost refuses. But then they come, laughing and smiling and tugging at his sleeves with cries of _come_ on_, Sasuke! Come on!_ And before he knows it he is in the sun and it is burning his eyes and he is scowling something ferocious but they are still bouncing and giggling and giddy with joy.

So he stops scowling and smirks. He raises his hand up high above his head, feels the stretch of muscle, the burning of this unfamiliar brightness, and throws his chin back. The breath he takes is so deep it almost hurts. Something sharp and hot pricks at the corners of his eyes and wants to be let out, but he refuses and forces it back. Then he looks at Naruto and Sakura.

First, they take him to the ramen bar. Silence falls as they enter, but Naruto and Sakura ignore it and promptly sit next to Kakashi and Sai. Kakashi smiles as Naruto congratulates him on being prompt. Sai tells Sakura her hair looks particularly horrendous today. Sasuke orders and eats and when he is done he drops enough money on the table for all five. Naruto hits his shoulder and yells out his thanks as Kakashi winks and Sai provides a slightly less derogatory nickname. Sakura squeezes his hand and gives him a funny feeling in his stomach.

Later, after Kakashi makes an excuse and Sai gives a final smile before wandering off, it is just the three of them. Naruto asks Sasuke to come train with him.

And just like that, everything hits him.

He says no and he means no and before they can react he is turning homebound and when he arrives he slams the door behind him and pulls at his hair until he realizes that some memories cannot be forced out.


	15. subliminal

**note:**

Long time no see, eh? I am terribly sorry and I have no real excuse such as death, debilitating illness, or sudden and irrevocable changes of lifestyle, but you probably wouldn't care even if I did. :) Suffice it to say that I am a bad updater/authoress. My bad, my bad.

However, if there are even any of you out there that still care, I am saying right now that, God willing, **I will finish this by January 20**. The one that's in 15 days. There are _about_ five chapters left. Wish my luck.

Finally, this chapter almost/sorta/_kinda_ follows the previous one, and will hopefully clear up the questions that a few reviewers had.

Thank you all!

.

**15.**

_subliminal_

.

"Hey, Sasuke."

_Sakura._

"Where were you?"

_Here. Alone. Waiting for you to come find me._

"You were supposed to meet us at the training grounds, remember?"

"Yes."

"Well then, where the hell were you?"

_Here. Alone. Trying to forget._

"Sasuke… I told you. You didn't have to actually train – "

_I wouldn't have anyway._

"- but we're leaving on a mission tomorrow morning – "

_I don't want you to._

"- and Kakashi hasn't seen you in a week, and we'll be gone and, c'mon Sasuke… "

"How long?" _How long will you be gone?_

"A week. Maybe two. Now, are you going to tell me why you ditched us?"

_No. _

"Sasuke?"

_Don't look at me like that – you don't know. You don't understand. _

"Do you want to talk about it?"

_Yes. _"No."

"Are you sure?"

_No. Not at all anymore._

"… Well, goodbye then. I guess I'll see you when – when I get back. Naruto will probably be around later. Sai too. And Kakshi. To say goodbye."

"Goodbye." _I'll miss you._ "Be careful, Sakura." _Please don't get hurt._

"Oh, Sasuke, I'm always careful."

_Never careful enough._

"And, remember, if you need to talk… Well, you know I'm here right? You can tell me anything?"

_Can I tell you about how they bled? Can I tell you about the red, and his sword, and my scream and the tears in his eyes? Can I tell you about my hate, my anger, my fury and hunger; the mad rush of power and the agony of final justice? If I tell you that when he died I hated him – **hated him** – for not letting me kill him, will you still see me the same? What will you think when I say I was also grateful? And will you laugh when I tell you that I still loved him, really, even then? Because I did. Because I do. And it was them that killed him. Them, that you serve and that you fight for and that I will never, never again be a pawn to. I won't train and I won't fight and I will not be a solider anymore. What would you say to that, Sakura?_

"I know." _Maybe someday I will._


	16. how to save a life

.

**16.**

_how to save a life_

.

Naruto thinks Sasuke is insane.

"Nutters, bonkers, bat-shit _crazy_!" Sasuke scowls, and Naruto is smart and experienced enough to duck in the seconds before the fist attempts to connect with his skull. Only barely ruffled, he stands and follows the straight, tall back that seems intent on loosing him in the winding hallways of the Uchiha main house. "I don't know how you're not excited about this."

Silence greets him. Silence always greets him. The effort it takes to get a rise or word out of Sasuke is phenomenal and only worth the effort because the ending explosion is entertaining on many sadistic levels. Today, however, Naruto is not looking to annoy, pester, or bug. Today, he has a more important mission. Sasuke walks into his kitchen and grabs a tomato (Naruto wonders, with the part of his mind that is not focused on his current predicament, why Sakura is so much more willing to supply him with _his_ favorite food. Then he realizes he already knows.)

"Sasuke! You can't eat that!" With a considerable amount of skill accumulated over his years of ninja training, Naruto leaps across the room. Unfortunately, Sasuke has had just as much training, and is in an arguably better position, and when he takes a single side step, Naruto crashes into the wall behind him with a screaming, straggled curse. Disengaging his head from the floor, he whirls on Sauske, face red and angry, fists clenched and foot stomping. Watching, eyebrows showing vague amusement, Sasuke takes a bite out of his unharmed fruit. Naruto explodes.

"This is kinda a big deal, you bastard! If we're not there in twenty minutes, then our team is going to be two people short and – _I told you_ – Team Thirteen is bringing in Chouji! I mean, have you _seen _the guy? Of course, he can't compete with me, but if I'm not there, our team's in trouble! Kakashi-sensei can hold his own, I guess, and Sai's got a decent stomach on him, and Sakura will out-do Ten-Ten, I'm pretty sure, but – But Chouji! And Neji too; the guy can really put it away, I tell you! And – "

"I cannot," Sasuke says, one corner of his mouth twitching up in what Naruto recognizes, cherishes, as a smile, "believe you guys are having a ramen eating contest with Team Thirteen."

The hard edge of Naruto's temper dulls, as fleeting as any of his moods, and his own teeth flash in a wide grin. "Don't you mean _we_? Besides, it was Gai that issued the challenge. Kakashi probably would have refused, but, well…"

"You were there." 

"I am the _king_ of ramen, and I knew a foolproof plan when I saw one. So c'mon Sasuke, _let's go!_"

There is a careful blankness to Sasuke's features as he stares at his best friend, an exact absence of anything resembling caring. "And why would I participate in such stupidity, idiot?"

For a second, the urge to once again leap across the room is overwhelming. Naruto can already feel the satisfying impact of his fist against Sasuke's flesh, hear the dull thunk of a well placed kick. He takes a deep breath.  

"Because I'm asking you too. Because Kakashi and Sai and Sakura are waiting at the ramen bar, facing down two green monsters and a couple other freaks, for us." Naruto pauses, and his face is horribly, horribly serious. "But mostly because, if you don't get yourself moving towards our certain victory, I'm going to tell Sakura I heard you saying her name in your sleep."

For a second, Sasuke is frozen; then his face is more mobile than it has been all day. Eyes widening and then narrowing, his mouth twists into a thin, angry line. "I was not!"

"I say you were," Naruto cackles and points to the flushed skin of Sasuke's neck. Growling, Sasuke steps foreword and throws a quick punch. Mostly managing a dodge, Naruto only stumbles and continues laughing.

Sasuke's face look mutinous. Abruptly, he turns, walking out of the room and away from Naruto's dying chuckles.

"Come on!" he snaps, voice mostly a growl. "We're going to be late."

* * *

**note:** I feel as though I've neglected NarutoxSasuke brotherly!love far too much ):


	17. in like a lion, out like a lamb

.

**17.**

.

**_(in like a lion)_**

Naruto knows he will never forget the day Sasuke returned. The memory is too bright, too painful, _too much_, for the afterimage to ever fade from his retinas.

Naruto remembers baa-chan, her face a tight, angry mask, and he remembers the strain in her voice as she told him his best friend was there to kill him. He remembers Sakura's gasp, her hand squeezing his own so tight his fingers numbed, and Kakashi's long, slow sigh. He remembers his own voice, growling and deep, angry and hurt, screaming that she was wrong.

But he remembers seeing Sasuke and knowing she wasn't.

The boy had been like a nightmare, a demon, a blow to the heart that left Naruto unable to breathe or think or truly react to the sudden onslaught he faced. Hysteria bubbling in his chest, he blocked, he ducked, he wove and twisted and wondered what the world was coming to, where everything had gone so horribly, horribly wrong.

And then Sasuke was standing over him, sword poised, and Naruto was fighting the blackness creeping over his eyes, forcing broken bones to work and begging the universe to please, please don't let family kill family again. With more strength than he rightfully had, Naruto looked up. What he saw was what, even past the bounds of forever, he would remember of this day.

Sasuke, looking down at him over the blade of a sword. Sasuke, who was sixteen and angry and hurt and determined and not – Naruto knew, knew like he knew Kakashi would always be late and Sai would always be an idiot – about to kill. Not about to murder the blonde struggling on the ground at his feet. Naruto let himself fall into the dirt.

That was when Sakura arrived, all ablaze in the fierce frenzy of protection. So no one else knew. No one but Naruto saw the truth.

Sasuke wouldn't have killed him.

.

**_(out like a lamb)_**

Naruto will never forget this moment.

Because here he is, at this ramen stand, about to enjoy a dinner he's had one thousand times over, just like any other day, when the world suddenly tilts on its side. In this second – this bright, glorious moment – Naruto sees.

Sakura is smiling as she walks down the road. That in itself is nothing shocking nor out of the ordinary; it is expected and familiar. It is not even truly odd to see Sasuke, following along behind her, his hand clasped in hers and connecting them like a leash. His steps are slow, easy, yet they match Sakura's with uncanny accuracy. There is no smile on his pale face, but there is no frown. When Sakura plunks herself down beside Naruto, calling out her order, their hands fall apart as easily as gravity.

Sasuke sits beside her, quietly ordering. Sakura then leans around Naruto and demands Sai tell her what, exactly, he asked Ten-Ten that had her so upset. It happens then. As Sakura begins a lecture about polite and proper questions, her voice rising and her cheeks flushing, Sasuke's eyes fall on her, and a small, honest smile tips his lips.

And Naruto knows.

_Knows_.

Knows like he knows the sun will rise, and Sakura will always punch him in the head, and Lee will always wear green spandex. It is suddenly so clear, so obvious, that he wonders how he missed it before, and how everyone else seems to be completely oblivious.

Later, as they are all leaving, heading their separate ways, Sakura asks him, in a suspicious voice, what has him smiling like a loon. Naruto just throws back his head and laughs until tears trail down his cheeks.

He wonders how she hasn't realized –

Sasuke loves Sakura.


	18. we, togetherly

.

**18.**

_**we, togetherly**_

.

.

1. _acid/jealousy_

Lee is – with his spandex, his bowl cut, his _heart_-marked eyes as he rushes at Sakura, love on his lips – the Green Monster defined.

-

2. _color_

It is nothing so love struck and sentimental as her coloring his world, just the simple truth that when she is around, he finds it easier to look.

-

3. _give_

He does not offer her his heart, his soul, his being, but in bits and pieces, fits and bursts, she comes to have more of him than any other.

-

4. _needle_

"Sasuke, that was stupid," she rips the metal from his side, heals it with a brush of her hand, "it's only training and I saw the shuriken coming – what in the world were you thinking?"

-

5. _slope_

And then one day she kisses his cheek and he sees that this slope is far too steep and he's too far gone.

-

6. _correspondence_

Stuck on his mirror, curled in his bowl, crumpled in the pockets of his shirt – they are little notes, figments of her silliness and child's play, and they are enough to get him through the missions that stretch too long.

-

7._ linger_

Beneath his steadying hands she rights her stumble, and it takes all the years of practice he has to pull away.

-

8. _charm_

Whoever taught her to flick her hair, to flash her teeth, to stand that way should be brutally punished, Sasuke thinks as he pays for the pocky Sakura had been trying to get for free.

-

9. _roads_

His life is a path that twists and bends and unravels beneath his feet, and yet, somehow, someway, still manages to always meet theirs.

-

10. _hunger_

On the day he is seventeen, Sasuke wakes up to Sakura (with Naruto, who has just shouted Sasuke conscious, hiding behind her) and for a pounding second knows the meaning of want.

-

11. _reciprocity_

"I won't hurt you again," he tells her back, silent and never-to-be-spoken, but aching to be heard.

-

12. _kind_

Sasuke is no fool; he knows that this girl, smiling as she helps an elderly man carry his groceries, deserves better than shadow-lurking monsters.

-

13. _fruity_

Then one day he sits and cuts an apple for her while she trains.

-

14. _half-life_

Three days after they leave on a mission, Sasuke finds himself in the throws of a nightmare with blank blue eyes and pink hair soaking to red.

-

15. _empire_

Maybe it's because she's a good listener, maybe it's because she acts like she truly, honestly cares (maybe it's for other reasons entirely), but Sasuke finds himself educating Sakura on what it means – what it _meant_ – to be an Uchiha.

-

16. _here and now_

And when she sits, quiet and morose for reasons he does not understand and cannot bear to ask, it is all he can do to simply scoot closer and give her the best smile he knows.

-

17. _rings_

For her laugh, he waits four seconds before ripping her carefully wrought daisy chain from his head.

-

18._ dust_

Cleaning the attic one day, Sakura – with dust-smeared cheeks, a scratched nose, watery eyes – sneezes and before he can block the thought, Sasuke knows it is the cutest thing he's ever seen.

-

19. _project_

"Hey, I gotta go… somewhere – Sasuke, just stick with Sakura, ok?"

-

20. _adore_

Oddly, nothing but quiet compliance occurs to Sasuke as Sakura heaps her mother's groceries into his waiting arms.

-

21. _murmur_

The sky is dark and Naruto's story is loud; all Sasuke registers is Sakura, dozing at his side and her lips, moving against the skin of his arm as she mutters truths he would give anything to hear.

-

22. _above_

"Thank you," she says, and rockets him up higher than he's ever been.

-

23._ below_

Beneath her father's hard, unapologetic stare, Sasuke remembers what if feels like to never be good enough.

-

24. _incalculable_

At first he tires to reason, to figure, but then he knows that the thrill of Sakura's touch can never be measured.

-

25. _wire_

There is a fine line that they walk, one that terrifies and exhilarates, and Sasuke knows that the day he finally topples will mark the end of whoever he is now.

-

26. _stone_

There are two names, he promises the solemn, stretching stone, that he will not live to see inscribed on the cool grey surface.

-

27. _bright_

Sakura smiles at Sasuke – really, truly, brilliantly smiles – and just like that, lights a fire that will never, never burn out.

-

28. _chime_

Ino looks up as the storefront bell sounds and shakes her head with a smile as Sasuke silently asks – with a tilted eyebrow, a demanding frown – for Sakura (when he leaves, she laughs until it hurts and dreams about fairy princesses with the best kind of happily ever after).

-

29. _laugh_

And when they are all around him, all four, and they are all laughing, the sound both disjointed and melodic, he feels something that burns up his throat and kisses his hardened heart and gives him the courage to smile and mean it.

-

30. _we_

Then one day he thinks _family_ and sees no blood, no hate; just their smiling faces rushing to greet him.

* * *

**note: **In which Sasuke falls falls falls and it's about damn time : ) Also, everyone who is concerned for my obviously lack-luster literacy, know this: I am aware 'togetherly' is not a true word. I still like it. That is all.


	19. sunstained

.

19.

**_sun-stained _**

.

They are, he suddenly knows, alive only because luck has permitted it.

"_This_," his voice is skeptical, condescending, and oddly curious, "is how you train?"

_This_, he wonders,_ is how you became the 'greatest ninja' of your generation?_

"Well, this is how we train _today_." Naruto smiles, wide and bright, and over his shoulder Sakura stealthily walks up a tree at the edge of the clearing, her chakra signiture fading out so completely that Sasuke is compelled to actually check for her physical presence. She smiles back and waves before disappearing into the canopy. He forces his gaze back to Naruto, whose eyes are closed as he silently counts to one-hundred.

"This is nothing but a child's game."

"This," one brilliant sliver of blue peeks out at Sasuke, "is fun. You should try having some one day."

Sasuke just shakes his head, settles down at the base of a tree, beneath a cool patch of shade, and watches as something that can only be described as a show begins.

"ONE HUNDRED!" Naruto's bellow sends birds flying, and there is something wild and predator-like in the way he turns to the empty clearing, in the way his shoulder roll and his legs flex. "Ready or not, here I come!"

First, Naruto stands in place, body tense, and Sasuke knows that he is trying to detect Sakura's chakra. After only a few seconds, the blonde recognizes a useless battle. Despite himself, Sasuke leans foreword as, with a whoop of enthusiasm, Naruto leaps into the trees. For a peaceful, empty moment, all is silent. Then there is a screech, a burst of laughter, and the unmistakable crashing and rustling of what must be a very heated pursuit. Sasuke hears Sakura's scream, Naruto's shout, and something like the forest falling down; he is surprised to find himself wanting to stand and follow, to watch and listen and be entertained.

When silence falls – suddenly and completely – a brief surge of hot panic rakes claws down his chest. He stands, wondering what has happened, what has gone wrong, where they are, _who did it_.

And then Sakura is there, right there, and she is running like the wind and there is a huge, manic grin on her face and Naruto is right behind her, cackling like the devil, and she is squealing, laughing, dashing up and leaping behind Sasuke, hiding, screaming when Naruto rams into Sasuke and sends him sprawling out –

They are, quite abruptly, nothing more than a mass of flailing limbs and raised voices.

"Ow!"

"Ha! Caught you!"

"Get _off!_"

"Hey! Watch where you're shoving your elbow!"

Sasuke, after a moment of shock, tries to right himself. At his side, Naruto grabs Sakura's leg, pulls her closer to him, and – Sasuke's mouth falls open – begins to tickle her without mercy.

"I win!"

"Stop!" she gasps, kicking wildly, pushing at his hands with a frantic, laughing, hysteria. "_Stop!"_

Her grasping arms find Sasuke.

Naruto is suddenly very still. He and Sakura are both looking at Sasuke with intense, frighteningly joyful expressions. _No,_ Sasuke thinks, his mouth already frowning, his tongue forming the word. _NO._

But then they are on him, and he is back on the ground, and there are fingers poking at his stomach, worming up under his arms. _Stop!_ his brain shouts, but his mouth is too busy trying to keep the laughter – the mirth that bubbles up with instant and alarming intensity – inside. Suddenly shameless, he begins to wriggle and twist and squirm and kick and his traitorous voice sounds, a beg and a plea and undeniably not angry, telling them to _knock it off. Get off me. Please, please, **please**._

His world dissolves into something that reminds of fighting for his life, except for that it really doesn't at all.

Then the world refocuses. Sasuke is face down in the grass, Naruto – laughing as he curses most vehemently – pinned beneath his legs and Sakura – giggling so hard she can hardly breathe – trapped beneath him. All he can see is sprawling green and endless blue.

Sasuke smiles so hard he is sure his face will crack.

* * *

**note: **Because the day Team Seven plays tag/has a tickle-fight, my heart will melt and my face will be stuck in a silly smile for all of eternity.


	20. catalyst

.

20.

**catalyst**

.

One night Sasuke awakes to Naruto yanking him from his bed.

The other boy is screaming and yelling and pulling him towards the door, words undistinguishable and loud, and Sasuke, still foggy in the haze of sleep and confusion and 'dobe, what the hell are you doing?', is fighting and kicking and screaming right back. But Naruto doesn't listen, and he only get louder, and his anger crowds the room with a dark, heavy presence until finally, Sasuke grabs onto the door frames and refuses to let go. Finally, Naruto stops and he reaches down and he drags Sasuke to his feet. Sasuke sees anger and hate and terror scrawled in a heavy hand across Naruto's face, and is suddenly very, very afraid.

"Sakura's gone!"

There is a heartbeat of silence and then: "What?"

"She gone!" There are tears gathering in Naruto's eyes. "She went on that solo healing mission – remember? – and she's supposed to be back but she's not and Tsunade got a letter this afternoon and she didn't want us to know but Kakashi heard it from another anbu and so he went and checked and they don't want to do anything yet, the elders don't want to be rash, but – "

Sasuke grabs Naruto's shoulder harder than he intends to, and his voice is weaker than he would have liked. "Naruto. _Where is Sakura?_"

Naruto swallows, hard, and a tremble runs across his face.

"She's been captured. Rogues are holding her for ransom."

Then Sasuke is letting him go and he is pulling on a shirt and shoving his feet into his boots and ripping the spare kunai holster from Naruto's hands. Briskly, he shoves past the blonde. As he does, he shoves past the hate and bitterness and lies and _I will never work for you_.

"Let's go, dobe."

As he rushes down the hallway, he feels the ghosts, their hands reaching out to stop him, their voices hissing _traitor_, and some small, dark part of him wants to stop, to turn around, to let those who deserve hell take care of their own problems.

But he doesn't. He won't.

He isn't doing this for them – those that stole his childhood and his innocence and his family. No.

He's doing this for Sakura.

–

Kakashi and Sai are waiting, hidden in the shadows, by the wall.

When Naruto and Sasuke arrive, Kakshi looks up from his book. The panic, concealed and near-invisible, in his eyes tells Sasuke that he had not been reading.

"You came," he says, visible eyebrow rising.

Anger boils up, concealing the flush of shame. "Yes." _Of course I did._

"We're sneaking out," Kakashi looks away, seemingly unconcerned. "We're not supposed to be here. We could get in trouble." His gaze falls back on Sasuke, and his voice carries a challenge. "You could get in even more."

Sai watches, face blank but eyes curious; Naruto is looking between the two men with confusion bordering on impatience. Sasuke straightens to his full height, crosses his arms across his chest, and glares at Kakashi with as much menace as he can muster. "I know." _I don't care._

Small and fleeting, Kakashi smiles, and his voice is gentle, almost proud, as he turns to address his team. "Alright then, we have a lot to plan."

–

They find the little cabin, hidden among the trees, when the sliver-moon is still high in the sky.

Among the trees, they watch and listen. Though it is silent, faint, sparse lights flicker through the windows. Sasuke wants to know why. Are they hurting her? Are they mocking her? Are they torturing her? For not the first time, he forces his clenched fists to relax, and his breathing to even. Still, his stomach burns and a voice of righteous, fierce anger tells him to forget caution, forget the plan, and attack. Now.

Then Kakashi appears.

"She's in there." His voice is tight, and he swallows once, hard, as though forcing something back. "They've got her."

"Is she hurt?" Naruto asks what Sasuke cannot bear to. "Is she ok?" His hands reach out, suddenly, grabbing at Kakashi's vest like a terrified, lost child. "Kakashi-sensei. Is she ok?"

"She's alive."

Not one in the group misses what he doesn't say.

Kakshi clears his throat.

"There's eight of them. I don't know how they managed to grab her, because they don't look too tough, but they're armed, so watch out. The cabin only has one room, and they have Sakura tied in the southeast corner. She's conscious, but I don't know for how much longer." There is a painful hitch in his voice before he continues. "So the plan stands: Naruto, Sai and I will keep them occupied and ensure they don't cause Sakura any more harm. Sasuke, you grab her. And then you get out of here. We're here for her." He looks straight at Sasuke. "Not to hurt them, not for revenge."

Sasuke nods.

–

Then they are in, and men are shouting, surprised, and they are scrambling for their knives, for their weapons, and Naruto is yelling out taunts, the sound filling the small space for the seconds before turmoil erupts.

Sasuke ignores it all.

He rushes across the room too fast for the startled buffoons to truly comprehend. One gets in his way, face snarling, but is dealt a swift, hard blow to the head with the hilt of a kunai. Sasuke allows himself a smirk at the sight of the rolling eyes and collapsing knees before he looks up, towards the back of the room, towards the shadows, where the fire doesn't quite illuminate and he sees –

Oh gods.

He sees Sakura.

She is bleeding. She is bruised. She is looking at him with a broken-lipped smile.

He is at her side in an instant, crouching down to slice clean through the ropes wound round her ankles, unsnapping the chakra-suckers and then standing, once against cutting her bonds with shaky hands. Beneath his trembling – why are they trembling? – fingers the pale skin is broken and discolored, and tremors run through her limbs. Her breathing is harsh and labored, and he can hear the way the air rattles up her throat. It occurs to him that he should say something – say anything – to let her know that he is here and that he will protect her and he will save her and he will bring her home and he will never let her get hurt ever again, so long as he lives. But the tight, hard thing in his throat makes it hard to speak.

He finishes with her binds and she falls foreword. Easily, he catches her and lifts her up, into his arms. Then he turns to survey the scene, looking for the easiest way out. Apparently, these men are stronger than Kakashi realizes; four are still fighting against the three Leaf ninja.

"Sasuke." Shocked, Sasuke looks down and immediately wishes he hadn't. Foggy green eyes look up at him, hooded by heavy lids. Blood beads slowly from Sakura's split bottom lip, and there is a patch of thick, dried blood at her right temple. There are bruises of every color spreading over her nose, her chin, her cheeks, her eyes. "I'm sorry." There is something pulling at his shirt and he knows without looking that it is Sakura's small hand. "I didn't mean – My chakra was low and – " Her heart is beating far too fast, and this close, Sasuke can feel the heat of a fever. "I'm sorry."

"It's ok," Sasuke says, even though it isn't at all. "I promise you, everything will be fine." Suddenly, his throat is so tight it is hard to breathe. "Go to sleep. It will be ok." And she looks up and him, this beaten girl with tiny, tiny arms and thin, thin legs and a body so thin that he can hardly feel it's weight, and she smiles. Sad and apologetic, marred by blood, but a smile nonetheless. Her eyes roll to the back of her head.

And Sasuke is angry.

Suddenly, everything in him knows that these men – these stupid, useless, evil men – will not live to see another day. Deep in his chest, something cold and dark and scaled rears its monstrous head, awakens and shouts for revenge, for justice, for _blood_. A familiar haze wild anger flows through him, and he relishes the power it brings, forgets the consequences. He is Uchiha Sasuke, the last Uchiha, possessor of the Mangekyo Sharingan, former member of the Akatsuki, and he will not allow this act to go unpunished. He will show them what happens when Sakura – who is kind and compassionate and as undeserving of hate as a person can be, who belongs to him as much as anyone can – is harmed. He steps foreword, intent on these weak, distracted men, who will be so easy to make suffer. Oh, and how they'll suffer, how he'll hurt them, how he'll destroy them, he will –

"Sasuke!" Naruto's shout barely registers. "Sasuke! _Stop! _Take Sakura! Take her and run!"

Sakura.

Sasuke looks down.

Sakura doesn't need him to attack her captors. She doesn't need to hear them scream. Sakura needs to get home, where she is safe and where there is help, people who love her. Sasuke blinks.

The black thing loosens its grip on his heart.

And Sasuke runs.

–

The day is bathed in predawn gray when they arrive at Kohona.

"We'll take her to the hospital," Kakashi is saying. "I'm sure Tsunade-sama will forgive our thoughtless rescue." He winks. "But you, Sasuke, need to get home. You weren't part of this, understand?"

Sasuke nods.

"Well then, hand her over to Naruto."

Naruto steps foreword and holds out his arms.

Sasuke carefully transfers the limp body, ignoring the voice that shouts at him to do no such thing, to keep Sakura close, to gather in his arms and tuck her head under his chin and keep her there until she was awake and whole and well. "Be careful," he tells Naruto.

Nodding, Naruto smiles down into the sleeping face. He adjusts his grip and Sasuke twitches. _Watch her head!_ Then he turns to Kakashi, the movement quick and abrupt. Sakura's legs swing. _Be careful!_ "What now?"

"Sai, go with Naruto to the hospital. I'll catch up."

Naruto nods and turns before running off, Sai in tow. In his arms, Sakura's body bounces in time to his pace. Sasuke takes a half-step foreword, his mind demanding that he follow and take Sakura back, consequences be damned. He turns away before his thoughts turn to action.

"We will send a messenger to let you know what has happened."

Sasuke grunts in response.

"And Sasuke?" Kakashi's smile shows through his mask. "Even though you were no way involved in our recovery of Sakura, you did a pretty damn good job. Thank you."

–

By the time he has leapt the wall and avoided the guards and finally made it to the familiar streets of the Uchiha district, dawn has broken.

He is running, fast and hard, for no reason except for that it is harder to think when his body is in motion. And he is trying very hard not to think of anything right now. Not blood, not bruises, not terror, not mussed pink hair and green eyes hallowed in black. Not family and betrayal and devotion and madness and the hollow, sick feeling of loss.

When he arrives at his house, he slams the door behind him and falls to the floor, back against the wood. He cannot help it, he cannot stop it. His fingers dig shallow grooves into his arms as he holds himself tight, trying to keep back the onslaught of nausea gripping him. In his chest, the pounding of his heart seems too quick and too hard, banging against a huge _something_ and hurting him worse than he can bear.

An hour later, the wood beneath his back reverberates and a sharp knock sounds. Sasuke stands, arranges his features into careful blankness, and pulls the door open. A chounnin stands there.

"Sakura Haruno is in the hospital. She arrived there this morning and is expected to be fully recovered within the day."

Once again, the door slams.

On shaky legs, weaving and wobbling down the familiar halls, Sasuke retreats to his room. Once there, he paces. Back and forth, back and forth.

_…expected to make a full recovery_.

This time. This time. And what of next? What will happen the day that the chounnin arrives, face crestfallen and tear stained? What if she is not held for ransom, but merely slaughtered, lost, dead in a ditch somewhere, beyond his or anybody's help? What then? Already, this is too much, this hurts too badly.

And it doesn't even have to be Sakura. What if it was Naruto?

What if it was Kakashi?

What if it was Sai?

What if they left him? What if they died?

And it hurts. It hurts. Deep and true, reverberating throughout his entire being, crippling him with memories of the past intertwing with visions of the future. Sakura, smiling with wet red lips for one last time. Naruto, reeling back and falling, falling, sword ran clean through. Kakashi's mask, blood-soaked in the grass. Sai's face, forever smiling that fake smile.

Sasuke knows what this is.

He knows what he's done.

And he hates himself for it.

* * *

**note:** That. Was. Long.

Also, please forgive any typos. I'll go back and fix them later 8)


	21. breaking point

.

21.

**breaking point **

.

He has known her, this girl of seventeen and green eyes and pink hair, for long enough to not be surprised when he feels her presence walk the path up to his house.

Still, where there is not shock, there is anger. She should not be here, now pushing open the ancient door of his home, walking softly down the hallway. She should be in the hospital, resting, being cared for, and staying far, far away from Sasuke and his tangled storm of emotions. _Stay away_, he commands silently, glaring at the wooden door of his room and listening to the approaching footfall. _Leave._

He does not have the strength to face her. Not now. Not when his fingers are still trembling in residual terror and his heart throbbing as though it has been scrubbed raw with metal coils. To see her face, healthy and smiling, will undo something in him; to see her any other way (he fights back the look of her face in dim light, speaking through bloodied lips) will be worse. Not ok. Horrible.

But, of course, he is not given a choice. As the door swings in, Sasuke turns around, eyes riveting to the smooth expanse of his blank wall, desperate in ways he doesn't understand, only sure he _cannot_ face Sakura. Now it is more that her footsteps that tell him where she is; he can hear her breathing, the soundless shifting of her body. She is too close.

"Sasuke?"

Tensing, Sasuke almost closes his eyes against her voice. Without conscious consent, his fingers curl into tight fists.

"Sasuke?" Her voice has taken a new lilt, one that wavers in the space between curious and annoyed, questioning and demanding. Sakura takes another step into the room, lessons the precious distance between her and the tense, silent figure of Sasuke. "Can you hear me?"

_Go away,_ he begs, scared for reasons he cannot grasp, only appreciate the terror of.

"God damn it!" She is upset and he is grateful for her anger; this will be easier if she is mad at him. "Sasuke!"

Then her hand is suddenly on his arm, fingers tightening, and she is pulling and Sasuke isn't quite ready for the way she _forces_ him to turn around. For all the time he has spent with this Sakura – the one that shatters mountains and flings trees – he still forgets what she can do. And despite all his careful efforts, despite the terror suddenly gripping him with icy, bitter claws, he is looking down into a face that is drawn in anger. A face without any bruising, not cuts nor scrapes nor injuries of any kind. For a fragile second, the fear is replaced with bright relief so great that his fingers literally twitch with the desire to reach up and confirm that the perfect, healthy skin is real.

Then Sakura speaks.

"What's the matter with you? Didn't you hear me?"

"Go away," he says, because he desperately wants her too, and those are the only words that will form in his mouth. "Go home Sakura."

There is tightening in the already wire thin line of her mouth; her eyebrows cut a terrible line above her glare. "What?"

Sasuke hears the threat, plain as day in her single word, and chooses to ignore it. "Go home." And then, because he cannot, for the life of him, help it: "You need to rest. You need to heal."

"I do not! I'm _fine_." In her anger, she has raised one hand, pointing a single accusing finger in his face. Despite her harsh tone and the way she is scowling at him, her animation – _she's alive, she's alive –_ relaxes the tight coil in his stomach. "I'm only here because you helped save me and I wanted to thank you and to tell you … well, to thank you. But now you're acting like an ass!" As her speech closes, she shoves her hands to her hips.

But the action is too harsh, too hardy, and it rustles the mostly-healed injuries that lurk beneath her skin. She winces minutely. Sasuke's hands are like those of a willful stranger; they shoot out, fingers splayed, intent on steadying this girl, this child from the night before, with bruises and blood and foggy green eyes. Though her stance now is steady, his hands and heart remember too well the shaky, fumbling movements of before, the dead weight of her body in faint, and it is suddenly desperately important that he keep her this way, alert and awake and standing tall.

But he catches himself. His hands stop, hovering just inches from the peach-pale of her shoulders. Eyes widening, Sakura looks from them to his face. There is surprise in her 'o'-shaped mouth and terrifying understanding in the way she looks at Sasuke, as though suddenly _seeing_ him. Behind the surprise, there is a blooming of knowledge so clear, something in Sasuke quivers in absolute fright.

"You need to go home. You're hurt." Sasuke's voice is hard to find and harder to steady. His mouth is dry and his throat hurts something awful. "You need to go home."

When she speaks, it is in a voice much softer, much lighter, and so, so understanding. "I'm fine, Sasuke. Really, I'm ok. I'm fine." The smile on her face, careful and encouraging, is too much. The tiny bruise he can see now, faint and ghosting, curling out from the hair at her temple, is too much. This feeling – this ache, pounding in his chest and reminding him of anger, hate, protection and devotion – is too much.

"You're not." He cannot believe the words that are coming from his mouth, but he cannot stop them either. They rush, fast and furious, now released and beyond his control. "You aren't now and you weren't then. You were hurt and you were bleeding and I thought – I thought you were… You might not have been ok, Sakura, we might not have come in time and they might have hurt you worse and – And what were you thinking? Why would you go by on that mission alone? You need to be careful, Sakura, and you need to stay safe and, please, don't get hurt again, and don't – don't leave m- don't leave."

He hears himself, suddenly. Hears all the confessions, all the truths, all the weaknesses he has, lain bare and plain before Sakura. Ashamed of his openness, and of the admissions he has made, but also simply because he is tired, spent, Sasuke lets his head and hands (which still hover, awkward) drop. Beneath him, the floor is steady, despite the spinning of his world.

And then Sakura is there, her feet in his field of vision, and there is something small and warm catching his hands, bringing them up. Sasuke looks at Sakura as she places his hands smoothly on her shoulders, where they would have fallen earlier. She smiles at him. He sees blinding, breathtaking trust. Adoration, too. And understanding. And green eyes, as familiar as anything in his life has ever been. But it is the smile, and all the care it contains, that is enough to force those last, strangled words.

"I was _so _scared."

"Oh, Sasuke." Her expression is mixed and jumbled, half overjoyed and half unbelievably sad. She raises her hands to either side of Sasuke's face, and pulls until he is looking right at her. Her thumbs glide over the hard angles of his cheeks in a slow, steady rhythm. Briefly, Sasuke thinks that, away from this moment and this storm of emotions rolling through him, the intimacy of the action would send him running. Not now. Now, it just fits. Sakura continues to speak in a soft, full voice.

"You don't have to be scared. I'm not going to leave you. Naruto isn't going to leave you. Kakashi won't and Said won't. We won't." She pauses and looks into Sasuke's hard, solemn face. Her smile take a new, honest lilt. "Love doesn't always have to hurt."

_I don't love you_, he almost says, on reflex.

But then, he catches himself. He thinks about Sakura, twelve years old and running at him, declaring herself, begging him to please, please stay. He thinks about the twist in his heart, the pain of knocking her unconscious and turning his back from the village and her. He thinks about her face, livid and snarling, the day he returned, and her punch, sending him flying into the earth. And then he remembers her understanding smile, her patient, slow touch in the face of his cold indifference. He didn't deserve that, did he? Neither did he deserve her care, her forgiveness, her help and her love. He thinks about that. He has never deserved even some part of what her and Naruto give, and yet, he's taken it and he's – he's treasured it. And, maybe, if the warm contentedness of now and the cold terror of last night (_just like ka-san just like nii-san please no please no_) are to be believed… Maybe he loves them too. Maybe there's no maybe.

So instead of denying, Sasuke does what feels most natural. He takes the hands that rest on his shoulder and he pulls them; pulls until Sakura is right there, right against his chest, and she is looking up at him with eyes that gleam wetly in the light and she is smiling and he feels himself smiling back because this is Sakura and she is ok and she is here, right here. Before he can think it over another second, before he convince himself that this is a bad idea, he wraps his arms around her and holds on tight. Around his own middle, two arms squeeze and there is a breathy, wet laugh coming from somewhere against his chest.

_Thank you, _he tells her. _Thank you thank you **thank you.**_

Sometime (he has no idea how much) later, Sakura pulls back. Not far, not away, just enough to look up at Sasuke. He smiles down, encouraged by the sudden joy rushing through him like blood, at Sakura. Sakura, who is loud and foolish and has eyes the color of new life.

He is aware of her arms, unwrapping themselves from around him. They are back on his face, directing his gaze. Sakura looks at his mouth, them once more into his eyes, and Sasuke knows what it going to happen. He does nothing to stop it.

Sakura kisses Sasuke.

And it feels like he's on fire, like he's drowning, like he's dying one thousand different deaths. It is more than the pressure of her lips on his; it is more than the way he clings to her, desperate and afraid and terribly, terribly happy. It is like breathing, and crying, and laughing, and smiling, and shouting out for nii-san and punching Naruto in the face and performing the perfect jutsu and everything in the whole entire world, all rolled into this one moment with this one girl.

It feels like life – and he is finally living.

It doesn't hurt at all.

* * *

**END**

**

* * *

**

… but not really. Epilogue will be up later tonight.


	22. later

.

epilogue:

**later**

_._

One day, Sasuke will fight again.

One day, Naruto will be hokage and he will wear that funny little hat with so much pride that Sasuke will laugh. Really, honestly, truly laugh. Naruto will only laugh in return, smile as he always has, and light the way. He will give Sasuke mission scrolls that are not dark things of duty and hate, power and money, but of honor and protection. Sasuke will complete the missions, one by one, and when he comes home, through the tall gates, people will smile, wave, and thank him.

One day, Sasuke will wake up and all he'll be able to see will be Sakura. She'll roll over, stretch, yawn, and open green, green eyes. Sleepily, she'll grin and curl in closer. He'll wrap his arms around her and hold on tight. Hold on forever. There will be no lingering darkness, no shadows of past deeds. It will be love and trust and faith and _I always believed in you_.

One day, Sasuke will have a family. There will be soft little heads of black hair and wide green eyes that spin to red. It will be shouts and screams and yells, hands tugging at his hair in the middle of the night and small voices shouting _look what nii-san did to me!_ And they will drive him mad, he is sure, because they will get that from their mother. But he will love them. He will love them so much it will hurt, hurt everyday, because they will fall and they will bleed and he will not always be there to protect them. But he will love them enough for one crooked, gap-toothed smile to make all the pain go away.

He will tell them stories sometimes, these little pieces of his forever, with their tiny bodies all jumbled around and on him. With lightening monsters and devil-doctors, with beast that roar and rage, he'll make their eyes wide and scared before giving them the happily ever after composed of white knights and princesses that saved the prince.

One day, Sasuke will call Naruto brother and Sakura love.

One day, this blister on his heart finally close, finally release all hold on him.

But not today.

Today, he trains with Naruto – throws his attacks with pride and determination, somehow able to forget the shame in the face of laughing blue – and not-quite trains with Sakura (because he is horrible, desperately afraid of hurting her and no matter how many times she shouts and sends him flying into the ground, he cannot find it in himself to truly fight her). He sits and listens with Kakashi and Sai-he-hates-less-everday in the ramen shop with the people that could have been – that _will be_ – his friends.

And he walks down the street, Naruto at his right and Sakura at his left and thinks that he is ok with waiting.

Because while he hasn't done so yet – the anger, the hate, the sadness, the confusion: they are so hard to let go of – Sasuke knows that someday, he'll be able to forgive the world. Forgive himself.

And maybe it's because _they_ already have.

* * *

**the note to end all notes:**

And there it is. Done-zo.

(Some part of my heart screams in victory while the other curls into a corner and cries with sadness)

Big, _massive_, painfully huge thanks to the ever-amazing **miko-chan** and **Neon Genesis**. Because they rock my world and are better pimps than I could ever truly deserve. And they are just awesome. Trust me. Their level of cool is higher than the rest of us can even imagine.

Also beyond imaginable-cool levels and deserving of a thank you are all my buddies over at LJ. You know who you are.

Finally:

Remember how I said this whole thing started off as a one-shot? Well, for those interested, I am going to post that little sucker on my LJ. Also, related drabbles that have accumulated over the course of writing this piece will be posted. Click on 'homepage' at yonder profile.

Thanks to everyone. You've made this fun 8)


End file.
